GOVERNMENT will soon embark on a tree planting exercise in Southern
Province in an effort to improve the rainfall pattern in the area.
Southern province Minister Edify Hamukale who was speaking during a
press briefing in Choma said the area had been experiencing
poor rainfall pattern in the past owing to deforestation and in some
instances as a result of charcoal burning.
Dr Hamukale said his vision was to re-install the rainfall pattern in
the province through the planting of trees.
“The rainfall pattern hasn’t been stable in the province, this is due
to deforestation and some areas have become semi-deserts,” Dr Hamukale
said.
Dr Hamukale noted that he would soon be meeting provincial heads of
departments, National Parks and Wildlife and Ministry of Education on how the
programme would be implemented.
He said schools and each family that have a child at any particular
school would be asked to plant one tree. And each School would also
be asked to have an orchard and should at least plant a minimum of 100 trees
which would help to contribute to the hydrological cycle.
“If all schools do this, then we can have a situation where the
rainfall pattern will stabilise. 100 trees in an orchard will help the
government to restore the ecological balance in Southern province,” he
said.
Meanwhile Dr Hamukale said his office would soon engage the Department
of National Parks and Wildlife on how best to sensitise the community
that live in the game management areas on dangers of poaching.
“We want to work with the Department of National Parks and Wildlife to
begin the sensitisation to primary schools against poaching, because
the animals are now extinct,” he said.
And Dr Hamukale assured of government’s commitment to electrify the
rural areas under the rural electrification programme.
This hamukale is just an i.d.i.o.t….
Hopefully thinking about replanting of indigenous tree species as exotics have their own disadvantages!
@1 FuManchu,100% with you! If we have restore ecological balance then we have to go back to the initial. We can plant our own indigenous trees but most of the people miss the point and introduce exotic species which later on hurt the environment as they suffocate other species,sometimes take in too much water or increase the acidity of soils. In fact we need to fund research on our own indigenous agro-forestry and not the copy paste approach.